I'm writing this article in January, just as I return to classes after the winter break. It was a wonderful respite, in part because I had time to do some uninterrupted reading, to lie on the couch and really get into a book, and then another, and another. Fortunately, I received several great books as Christmas gifts –– and I augmented this stack with a few gifts to myself. There was no real rhyme or reason to the selection, but as I look back over my reading spree, I notice that a couple of themes weave the books together, and I'd like to examine them here.

I began the holidays with Sara Maitland's (2008) The Book of Silence, which describes her exploration over a number of years of silence and solitude. They go together. It's difficult to have true silence in the company of others, as Maitland discovered when she slowly moved toward a silent life. First, separation from her husband found her living alone, but that didn't seem to be enough for her, so she tried a number of experiments in deeper silence. These included a six-week retreat on the Isle of Skye. She had stocked up on food and other necessities so she wouldn't have to interact with anyone, though she does admit to having had a cell phone and a car radio for emergencies. She found this a deeply transforming experience, which just made her hunger for more silence. This led to three years in a small house in an isolated part of England, a silent retreat in the desert, and another in the primeval woods of Scotland. Maitland finally built her own retreat because she simply didn't want to give up the silence she had discovered.

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